Panamaximum Overdrive

I’d hoped that my border woes would be over with for a while once I actually set wheels in Panama, but it wasn't to be. I wasn’t even out of sight of the border crossing when I was stopped at a military police checkpoint and had all my documents examined, as though I’d somehow snuck an enormous white motorcycle full of luggage, not to mention my geared-up self, through immigration without anyone noticing. The source of my annoyance wasn’t solely bureaucratic; I could see a solid column of rain moving towards the highway and wanted as much time as I could to outrun it. Satisfied for the moment, the MPs let me through with an absolute denial of my request to park for a few minutes and put on my waterproofs, which ensured that the absolute torrent that fell out of the sky not even a minute later soaked me through immediately. Muttering a string of unintelligible angry words into my helmet, I stopped under a tree, threw the waterproof liner in my jacket, exchanged my summer gloves for my insulated and waterproof ones, and continued on, with distinctly more water in my bags than there had been before. There was nothing for it; I had wasted hours at the border and was now looking at yet another ride into the night, even though it was only the early afternoon. The Panamanian leg of the Pan-American Highway was at least smooth and had a suitably high speed limit, though not without its quirks; moments after passing a slow-moving truck, I came over a rise and was immediately lit up by a police officer on a motorcycle who’d been lurking under a bridge. My stomach turned; I’d ridden five thousand miles with absolutely no problems from the police, but everything about what was happening screamed “shakedown” to me. Still, not wanting to end up in a bona fide police chase in the pouring rain, I pulled over and stopped next to his bike.

“Hablas Español?” he asked. “Not really,” I replied, in the least accented English I could muster. This was an outright lie, but every source I’d drawn on for this trip advised playing stupid in situations like this. “You know speed limit 50?” he said, showing me a radar gun with 106 on the readout, to which I shook my head. This was the truth; the last speed limit sign I’d seen had read 110 kph, and I assumed I’d either missed a sign while passing the truck earlier, or that it had been covered up by trees or bushes. “Zona poblada” he said. “You slow down when zona of people. You have license?” I pointed to my right side bag, where I’d placed my wallet to keep it dry in the pouring rain. “It’s in there.” The officer gave me an annoyed look, stuck a finger in my face with another admonishment of “Slow down with people,” and waved me on. I looked around as I took off; the supposed zona poblada consisted of one dirt driveway leading to a couple of shacks so far off the road they were barely visible through the tall grass. Clearly speed traps are a concept that defies all bounds of border and language.

I was stopped again scarcely a few kilometers later, this time at another Policia Militar checkpoint, and while the cars and trucks ahead of me were being waved through without even stopping, the officer doing so immediately zeroed in on the bike and waved me over. “Documentas,” he demanded, and I sensed the stupid American routine wasn’t going to work here. This was starting to get ridiculous; the rain had started again, and I didn’t even want to think about what would happen if my newly stamped Aduana documents and the original title and registration I’d carried the whole way got ruined by rain. Luckily, after finding everything satisfactorily in order, I was sent on with little more annoyance than a wet seat. I was genuinely worried that this was going to become a routine thing, but fortunately that checkpoint was the last time anyone checked my documents until the exit process.

I was steadily starting to curse myself for planning this trip in the middle of the Central American rainy season; the weather had been bouncing between light sprinkles and torrential rain for the entire afternoon, and the clouds obscuring the hills and mountains around me gave no sign that that was going to change. I pulled over at a gas station to fill up and wait out the rain, and all I got was an even heavier downpour; at least it gave me a chance to put the waterproofing in my pants. About 10 km down the road from the gas station, I saw something flapping in the corner of my mirror, and looking back, realized that I’d left the top of one of my side bags open when I’d put my wallet back in. Furious at myself, I pulled over to close it; the whole inside was covered in rain and both my wallet and camping gear were soaked, though the money inside was miraculously dry. Fortunately, the rain let up as the sun set, and although my rule about riding at night had gone out the window long ago, I felt quite safe on the Pan-American; the closer I got to Panama City, the more modern everything started to look, and all of the 24-hour gas stations had security guards around. I pulled off at a particularly large one, chuckling at the “Ven y Va” sign after having grown up getting most of my fuel at Kum & Go stations in the Midwest.

As I was filling up, a huge man in motorcycle club colors walked up to me, asking something I couldn’t understand. All I could muster was a confused look, and he repeated the word again, pointing to the swingarm of my bike and pantomiming something going around in a circle. “Este?” I said, pointing to my chain, and he nodded. “Está rompido?” I asked, to which he also nodded. “Tienes un otro?” I shook my head apologetically; even if I’d had the room for a spare chain and sprockets, they would have added at least ten pounds to my already heavy load, but I realized that I didn’t even have a spare master link to repair my own with in the event of a similar emergency and made a mental note to find one before covering any more significant distances. He waved a few of his fellow club members over to get a look at the Twin; they were all on either large cruisers or touring bikes, far larger than I was accustomed to seeing in Latin America, and I figured they were another sign I was approaching the prosperous Panama City. After answering the usual questions and some banter back and forth about the joys of motorcycle travel, I wished them good luck in getting their broken-down companion back on the road, and they wished me safe passage through the rest of Panama. I caught a few admiring glances and waves as I pushed off on the Twin; 5,000+ miles of riding in less than two months apparently carried at least a bit of street cred.

Rejoining the Panamericana for what I hoped would be my final push into Panama City, I nearly collided with the rear end of a car that stopped abruptly in front of me a few km away from the station I’d stopped at. I was ready to have it out with the driver when I realized why he’d stopped so suddenly; a gigantic tree had fallen across both lanes, and judging by the fact that we were only one or two cars back from the front of a growing line, it must have fallen just moments prior. A couple of guys were already out of their cars pulling branches off the road and trying to cut a path around the shoulder with a machete, and I grabbed my own and joined them. In a few minutes, we managed to clear enough brush for cars to get through single-file, and I was just about to do so myself when a fire engine pulled up on the other side, turned around, and blocked the road past the tree. The bomberos quickly got to work with chainsaws, and in a few more minutes the road was clear. I gave them an appreciative wave as I passed, pointing to the National Registry paramedic patch sewn to one of my side bags and the WEMA logo on the back, and they responded with waves out the window of their engine and a blast on the horn. One more thing that transcends borders.

Although it was nearly 11:00 at night and I was rapidly getting tired, my first glimpse of Panama City was still a sight that got my pulse racing. From near pitch darkness, I all of a sudden emerged onto a huge bridge over what I was sure was the entrance to the canal. The scene below me was an ocean of light, from the enormous cranes and docks on the shore, and the long line of cargo ships stretching out into the bay. Beyond the Canal, the skyscrapers of Panama City rose up along the waterfront, looking like pillars of light. My destination was one of those buildings, the home of Nanette, one of Ngaire’s former professors from Tulane, and her husband Eric. Traffic at night was nonexistent, making my final few miles into the city quite easy, and after a bit of confusion over exactly where I was supposed to park, I made it to Nanette and Eric's utterly gorgeous 21st-floor condo. I know I looked a sight, water dripping from my gear, my hair a mess, and carrying a couple of dirty motorcycle bags, but they welcomed me like family. I've never been so grateful for a comfortable bed and a warm shower.

The view from Nanette & Eric's 21st-floor home

I wasn't just in Panama City for the hospitality, and in fact you could probably say it was the only place I had to go "on business" other than the border crossings; the Panamanian national police division, or DIJ, requires an exit inspection for any foreign vehicle leaving the country, and Panama City was the closest place I'd be able to get mine before heading to Puerto Lindo, my port of departure. I also had to be at the DIJ office at or before 6 AM to even have a shot at a place in line, which was why I'd cut my time in Costa Rica short and blitzed it to Panama City; given my prior experiences with Central American bureaucracy, I wanted a day or two in hand.

I spent Monday 9/16 simply relaxing; after the whirlwind of Ometepe, crossing into Costa Rica, traversing the whole country in only three days, and riding over 450 km to Panama City had me feeling a little wiped out, and spending a whole day doing nothing but relaxing, washing every bit of clothing I had with me, watching Netflix shows I can't get in the US (hello, Archer!), printing off the mind-numbing amount of paperwork I needed for DIJ and subsequent customs inspections in Panama and Colombia, and catching up on all the writing and photo editing I hadn't done over the previous week. The excellent food prepared by Bertha, the housekeeper, certainly didn't hurt either.

Tuesday morning, I woke up at 5 AM and headed straight to the DIJ offices. Despite arriving at 5:45, I ended up 14th in line out of 20 inspections scheduled that morning, thankful that I hadn't hit the snooze button. It turned out that DIJ required a similar inspection for changes of ownership, registration of vehicles imported by residents, engine changes, and commercial licenses; I was one of only three applying for exit permission, and the only motorcycle. The actual process didn't take too long once my number was up (thanks in large part to the documents I'd prepared the day before), I had some adorable company while I waited, and I was back by 9 AM.

I'd made it back in time for breakfast, which meant that I could get the full experience of drinking coffee with Nanette and Eric. In between Nanette's teaching job and Eric's role as head of a small shipping company, the two are co-producing a documentary about the Panamanian coffee industry, which has grown from a small, barely profitable grassroots industry to a world-class operation, driven in large part by the fact that Panama is one of the few coffee-producing countries whose growers set their own prices, and by the worldwide awards their products have earned. The team producing the documentary has been traveling all over Panama, interviewing coffee growers and brokers, while compiling the many local variants, some of which can sell for upwards of $4,000/lb. Eric explained all of this to me while meticulously preparing our morning coffee, talking me through the amount, grind, filtration, and pouring pattern, and the result was possibly the best single cup of coffee I've ever had. I almost never drink my coffee black, but this was something else; I could actually taste the fruity undertones, and it didn't have the overwhelming bitterness I usually mitigated with milk and sugar. I snuck a glance at the price tag on the bag later on, and calculated it at just over $275/lb; no wonder it was so good.

Heavy rain had thwarted my plans to explore Panama City and the Canal zone on Tuesday afternoon, so after a late breakfast on Wednesday and more unbelievably good coffee (seriously, this trip has ruined American coffee shops forever), I set off towards the famed Biomuseo and the Miraflores locks. The Biomuseo is Panama City's natural history museum, contained within a wildly colorful building that looks like a giant piece of abstract sculpture. I balked at the $30 admission for foreigners, but the building made for some interesting photos, and had a very nice free exhibit on the first floor chronicling Panama's natural and human history.

After a quick lunch on the street, I moved on to the thing I'd wanted to see most in Panama City: the Canal. The closest public access is at the Miraflores Locks, which also holds a very interesting five-story museum and observation deck; I learned a great deal about the original design and construction of the Canal, including that it was originally planned as a sea-level construction with no locks (which would have been an ecological disaster on multiple levels), and how far construction techniques advanced during the time it was under construction. Nearly all of the exhibits were fascinating on some level, particularly the simulated ship's bridge with a time-lapse of a transit through the Canal playing, and the description of the constant preventative maintenance the locks and facilities are under in order to maintain their 24/7/365 work. The best part for me, though, was the observation area. I happened to visit the Canal on a fairly busy day, and emerged to find a medium-sized container ship just about to exit at sea level, while an enormous red-and-white roll-on/roll-off carrier (RO-RO) was entering from the Canal side. Miraflores has two sets of locks, each approximately 1,000 feet long and 110 feet wide, and each raising and lowering ships approximately 8 meters (27 feet) before they are released by two enormous sets of gates. Watching the ships transiting the locks felt like watching an episode of "Modern Marvels;" the RO-RO ships in particular were like watching a skyscraper being moved through a drinking straw. I was so fascinated by the process, and by the ships themselves, that I spent nearly three hours on the observation deck without really realizing it.

Thursday marked the end of my time in Panama City; with my boat for Colombia leaving on Friday 9/20, I had to get up to Colón, on the Caribbean coast, in order to get my final exit stamp and documents for the bike. I bid fond farewell to Eric and Nanette in the early afternoon; though Colón was only supposed to be an hour's ride from Panama City, I ran into one of the fiercest downpours I'd experienced the entire trip. Visibility even in the city was near-zero, and I was watching streets flood underneath my feet. Luckily, the torrent only lasted about as far as the highway, and I was soon on my way in clear weather. I reached the Aduana office in Colón by 3 PM, expecting that I'd end up having to drop the bike off in Puerto Lindo, our place of departure, the next morning. To my extreme surprise, however, the Aduana agent took my stacks of documents, checked each of them in rapid succession, requested a copy of my driver's license which I happily provided, and promptly stamped me out of Panama. The entire process had taken about 20 minutes, far quicker than anything I'd experienced so far. Hardly believing my luck, I called the sailing company to ensure I'd still be able to get the bike on the boat that day, and headed off for Puerto Lindo.

Where the ride to Colón had been nothing but interstate-equivalent highways, the ride to Puerto Lindo took me on a series of scenic, rural roads following the coastline, and providing some beautiful views along the way. As I arrived in the port, I was met by a skeptical security guard asking me what I was doing there. "Busco el Wild Card," I replied, and he pointed me to one of the concrete docks. I was waved onto the dock itself, where I pulled up next to a 60-foot-long single-masted sailing vessel with a turquoise hull; this was the Wild Card, the boat that would take the Twin and me around the Darien Gap, through the San Blas Islands off the coast of Panama, and to Cartagena, Colombia, along with 17 other passengers. I was greeted by Charlie, our South African captain, and after I'd removed all of the bags and ensuring they were safe below deck, Charlie assured me that the bike would be safe next to the boat for the night, and that it would be loaded when I returned for the 10 A.M. departure. He also arranged an inexpensive hostel for me and two German women who'd booked last minute passage, run by another German living in Puerto Lindo, and so that was that. It didn't dawn on me until we were on our way out of the port that I'd just stepped off the Twin for the last time in Central America. It had carried me just over 5,600 miles, survived two falls, a collision, torrential rains, and nearly every type of environment I could possibly have thrown at it, and had given absolutely no trouble whatsoever. I felt a rush of gratitude to the machine as I left it behind, accompanied by an even greater rush of excitement for what lay ahead.